Samurai swords, cutlasses, machetes, zombie knives, guns — all seized by police in just one week. The haul, just some of which is shown here, is proof of the terrifying reality of the crime epidemic plaguing our capital.

The weapons were acquired by Metropolitan Police officers during routine ‘stop and search’ incidents across London’s boroughs.

The city didn’t have to wait long for its first knife crime victim to fall this week.

At around 11.30am on Monday, it was business as usual at the Costa coffee shop on the main street in the North London suburb of Arnos Grove.

Machete discovered on a youth in Greenwich after his friend taunted police for taking a short food break, left, and imitation firearm found on a man outside Brixton Tube on Thursday, right. While harmless, such ‘weapons’ cause real alarm

Kukri knife found during a stop and search in Plumstead last weekend, left, and machete found in Lambeth on Wednesday night, right. ‘No you’re right, stop and search clearly doesn’t work!!’ says police tweet

Then, for reasons which are not yet clear, there was a disturbance and a customer plunged a knife into another. The victim was critically injured and had to be airlifted to hospital.

The assailant, described by witnesses as a man in his 20s wearing a suit, ran from the cafe but an arrest was subsequently made.

A blood-stained knife was recovered on the pavement near the scene. Crime scene photos showed a short blade with a black handle, the likes of which you might find in your kitchen drawer.

This sort of thing never used to happen in Arnos Grove. But this is London in 2018. And knife crime is ‘business as usual’ for a city beset by a spike in frequently fatal violence.

Pictured: Zombie knife picked up in Redbridge. The weapons were acquired by Metropolitan Police officers during routine ‘stop and search’ incidents across London’s boroughs

Pictured: Imitation automatic pistol with magazine. Found on a male in Hackney on Thursday night

Ten minutes later, and 14 miles away across the Thames from the Costa incident, a 62-year-old widow was found dead at her home in Balham. A man has been arrested on suspicion of murder.

This death was a milestone. It took the number of homicide cases in the capital since the start of 2018 past the total for the whole of 2017, excluding terror attacks.

And there are six weeks of this year still to go. In February and March, London’s homicide figures even topped those of New York, whose citizens hold 50,000 gun permits, as well as there being many times more illegal firearms on its streets.

In London, however, the main killer is not the gun but the knife.

Fearsome knife seized by Barking and Dagenham police yesterday, left, and combat knife discovered during stop and search in Orpington last weekend, right

Pictured: Hunting knife in the possession of a 16-year-old girl in East Finchley. The haul, just some of which is shown here, is proof of the terrifying reality of the crime epidemic plaguing our capital

The majority of murder investigations in 2018 — 68 out of 119 —have been stabbings. Thirty of these were of boys and young men aged 15-24, mostly black, mostly in the poorer neighbourhoods.

Another nine in this age group were shot dead. During the whole of 2014 the Metropolitan Police recorded ‘only’ 91 homicide cases. This was a huge drop from the 164 in 2007, so it has been worse.

But disturbingly the trend is on the rise again.

Never mind assault rifles, the knife deaths came with machine gun rapidity in South London around the start of this month.

Pictured: A combat knife recovered from a stop and search in the east London borough of Tower Hamlets last weekend

Share this article

Cutlass-style machete from last weekend in Brent, left, and Samurai-style sword and scabbard hidden down a youth’s trouser leg on an Islington estate on Tuesday, right

On Halloween ‘adored’ father Rocky Djelal, 38, was fatally stabbed in broad daylight in Southwark Park in Rotherhithe.

The following day, 15-year-old Jay Hughes was killed in Bellingham, South-East London.

A single stab wound to the heart was inflicted by a large knife wielded by a hooded figure who looked little older than Jay.

The victim was standing outside a chicken shop. All this was caught on CCTV. The size of the knife, the stringy assassin and the obvious intent are horrifying. The next day the slaughter continued. Malcolm Mide-Madariola, 17, was fatally knifed outside Clapham South Tube station.

Imitation pistol discovered during a stop and search in Tower Hamlets on Sunday, left, and Zombie knife picked up in Dagenham, right

Then a respite — two days —before Ayodeji Habeeb Azeez, 22, was stabbed in Samos Road, Anerley, also in South London.

The following day John Ogunjobi, aged 16, was killed in Tulse Hill around midnight.

John’s death was another milestone. The 250th stabbing death in Britain in 2018, demonstrating the knife-crime epidemic is not London’s alone.

And in the early hours of yesterday officers released a picture of the camouflaged hunting knife they found in the possession of a 16-year-old girl in East Finchley.

Many of the finds were a result of Territorial Support Group (TSG) units — specialist crime teams within The Met — acting on intelligence, such as the large zombie knife found by an anti-gangs unit in a block of flats in Dagenham.

Pictured: Knives uncovered in a stop and search of a car in West Hendon, in the London Borough of Barnet, last weekend

Pictured: Machete seized by Greenwich Gangs Unit from a car in Woolwich dockyard area on Thursday night

Others were the result of intuition. On an estate in Islington on Tuesday a young man was stopped and found to have a lethal Samurai style sword in a scabbard tucked down his trouser leg.

Sometimes the bravado of the weapons’ carriers brings about their downfall.

In Woolwich, also on Tuesday, a youth taunted members of an anti-gang unit for taking a short food break.

The officers turned the tables and searched both him and a friend, who was found to be carrying a machete with a blade more than a foot long. Why is this happening and what is to be done?

Police spending was slashed in the austerity budget of 2010. Since then the UK police force has lost 20,000 officers and seen its budget reduced by £12.3 billion.

But effective police tactics — as well as more resources — are also needed.

And, as this horrifying haul demonstrates, stop and search is an immensely useful tool when it comes to removing dangerous weapons from our streets.

Amid a collective ‘panic’ and much soul searching — London Mayor Sadiq Khan claimed it would take ten years to fix — much discussion has focused on policing, gang membership and drug crime. The latter two drive much of the violence behind the murder statistics.

It is likely these zombie knives, machetes, swords and imitation firearms carried on the capital’s streets are just the tip of the iceberg.

But they do demonstrate why and how there has been an upsurge in bloodshed.

Advertisement

Share or comment on this article:

How all these knives and guns were seized by stop and search police in London this week